Lost and Found
by LordCthulhu
Summary: Jack finds another survivor during the final gasping breath of human civilization. Can they reach each other in time to make a difference?
1. Lost and Found Chapter 1

Author's Note: Thanks go out to Christy for beta'ing this story. I appreciate all your helpful tips and pointers.

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Jack pumped the shotgun once. The spent shell ejected out the side of the receiver and the last shell loaded into the chamber. That last shell was a death knell. That was the last shotgun shell that Jack had, after that, he was down to clobbering these things with the stock of the shotgun. He had done it before, but every time he had to, he knew that he ran the risk of getting infected.

The cloud of smoke from the previous shot cleared and Jack could see the shattered remains of the undead creature in front of him. The right side of its head was shredded beyond identification. A single eye looked up from the decimated skull, staring into the sunny sky.

Jack looked around and saw exactly what he expected; the sound of the blast was attracting more of them. He could see at least ten of them making their slow, plodding way towards him. Where there was one of them, there were at least five more that he didn't see. His time was limited, as were his options.

Grabbing his tattered backpack, he ran towards an abandoned building. That thought made him chuckle, despite the situation, most buildings were abandoned nowadays. If they weren't, the occupants weren't usually someone you would want to bunk up with anyway. He moved fast for his slightly overweight body, dodging the undead for days at a time would put a new lightness to your step. He ran around the burned out hulks of cars and debris that littered the street.

He reached the building and leaned against the brick facade surrounding the front entrance. He looked out across the street, there were at least fifty of them now. They moved toward him in a single-minded quest for nourishment. The sounds emanating from them were both comforting and disturbing. The sound of a human voice however distorted was good to hear, but the moan of souls torn from the grave was more than a little disquieting.

Opening the right half of the glass double doors, the inscription on the doors read "Denny's Bait Shop". He caught a quick glimpse of himself in the reflection of the door. A shotgun in one hand, dressed in a tattered green work shirt and dirty pair of oversized blue jeans, he almost looked heroic. If there was anyone else to see him, but the only eyes watching now were not looking at his clothes; they were interested in only one thing, the sweet tender meat inside his trembling skin.

Jack walked into the dark interior of the bait shop, the smell of rotten fish immediately overwhelming his sense of smell. He choked and opened his mouth to breathe but could still taste the rank odor that saturated the interior of the store. Moving slowly, he leveled the shotgun in front of him, anything popping into his field of vision was going to get a face full of buckshot.

He did a quiet sweep of the front part of the store. All that was left was behind the counter and the storage area. Areas with a lot of sudden corners, blind spots, and lurking places. Jack's nerves screamed at him in danger as he took his first steps behind the counter. One wrong move, even just a single bite from one of those things, and it would be all over.

One combat boot kicked open the workroom of Denny's shop. The door swung open, revealing a dimly lit area. A flourescent light on the ceiling cast its pale light on the dingy room. Boxes of fishing equipment lined the cheaply made shelves along the walls. In the center were two eight-foot church tables covered in repair equipment and fishing lures. In the center of the milieu was the _piece de resistance_, Denny himself, lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood. Jack recognized him from the photos hanging behind the counter in the front of the shop. A handgun lay beside him, the last testament to Denny, a single bullet taking his life and most of the top of his head with it. Still wary, Jack closed and locked the door behind him. He looked around seeing the two other doors in the room, a freezer door towards the back of the room and another door across the room from his position.

Moving quickly, Jack crossed to the other door and closed and locked it. The freezer door was secured with a steel pin in the door lock. Jack wondered what was in the freezer. Figuring there would be enough time to find out later; he checked Denny's body to make sure it was completely dead. It was, Denny had chosen to take the route of suicide rather than become one of these things or even live in a world populated by the undead. Jack hoped against hope as he picked up the pistol. It was a revolver. Flipping open the cylinder, he smiled for the first time in days as he saw that there were still four unused rounds. Two spent rounds were still in there. One for Denny, but what happened to the other bullet?

Jack was sure that the other bullet was probably inside whatever was in the freezer. Not wanting to find out exactly why the former Denny locked something in the walk-in freezer, Jack searched the room for any other useful materials. He would have to get moving pretty quick or he would be trapped in this room with a dead body and a freezer full of the unknown. He found a couple of fillet knives, a half-full box of shotgun shells for a .20 gauge shotgun. Too bad Jack was carrying a .12 gauge. That meant there was probably another shotgun somewhere on the premises, but it was certainly not in this room.

Jack sat down at the table and swept his arm across the surface, knocking the contents on the floor. Two errant fish hooks stuck in the arm of his shirt, he pulled them out and threw them on the floor where they bounced away from him. He set out his supplies on the table. A still unopened can of tuna, eleven .20 gauge shotgun shells, one .12 gauge shotgun shell, a .12 gauge shotgun, a .38 revolver with 4 bullets left, two still sharp fillet knives, a mostly full canteen of flat Mountain Dew, two slices of moldy bread in a sandwich bag, and a copy of Us Weekly with Britney Spears on the cover. Not much in the way of worldly possessions, but they kept him alive this long.

Jack laid his head against his arms and closed his eyes.

Jack awoke, his eyes slowly focusing on the floor underneath the table. He drew in a deep breath and lifted his head. He looked at his watch.

"Oh shit!" He said aloud. He had been asleep for two hours. He swept his supplies back into his pack with the exception of the shotgun and the pistol. He slung the shotgun on its makeshift sling over his shoulder and cocked the .38. He moved to the door leading into the front of the shop, he could hear banging and cracking. They were inside, and they were looking for him. There was no escape that way.

Running across the room, Jack listened at the other door, there were no noises coming from the other side. Turning the knob, he tried to disengage the deadbolts as quietly as possible, but there was still an audible click as the bolt _snicked_ back into the mechanism. Left hand on the door handle, he pulled the door open slowly, his right hand holding the revolver in a death grip.

The door revealed a yellow-brown hallway with light being provided by a naked light bulb in the ceiling and a red EXIT sign. The hallway took a left turn at the end, where the EXIT sign pointed to a possible escape route. On the right side of the hall was a closed door. The hallway smelt of fish and old cigarette smoke.

Jack entered, pulling the door shut behind him. It closed with a soft click. Still holding the revolver, Jack moved down the corridor. He came to the EXIT sign and looked to the left. There was a solid steel door with a handle across it. Jack walked to the door and leaned his ear against it. The warm metal felt good against his face, there were sounds from the other side, but he couldn't tell if they were near or far. Hoping that luck was on his side, he backed up a couple of feet and kicked the door open.

The door swung outward and banged into something in its path. Jack didn't need to see it to know what it was. He could see well enough what was out there. At least 40 zombies lurched around outside the door; their heads slowly turning to look as the door began its quick revolution back to closed.

He was trapped. In a bait shop with rotten fish and a dead man. There was something in the freezer, but Jack wasn't brave enough to find out what that was quite yet. Jack slumped against the wall and slid down to the floor. A million thoughts ran through his head, none of them useful.


	2. Lost and Found Chapter 2

Trisha looked at her shaking hands. They had been shaking for days. It wasn't from lack of food or water, although that would become an issue pretty quickly, they just shook, probably from shock or nerves. With hands like this, she would never be able to defend herself out there. However, she had no choice, she had depleted the water and food.

Her eyes closed and she drifted into sleep like so many times before. Her hands shook, the repercussions of her mental state echoing through her, even while she slept.

BLAM! The sound of a gun firing woke her up. The sound of a gun firing? That meant there was someone nearby, someone living!

She gathered up her clothes and what little rations she had left into a duffel bag made by her oldest son, Michael. Michael, the one on the stairs leading up to the second floor. Michael's father shot him when he tried to attack Trisha. The orange bag was poorly made, but its value was priceless to Trisha.

Trisha reached up and with one trembling hand pulled the cord that turned on the overhead light in the basement. The fluorescent lights came to life with a hum filling the room with a dim white light. She avoided looking in the far corner of the basement, at the corpse of her husband.

Trisha sat down heavily on the floor. Beside her was the bloodied bat she had used to kill him. Her only weapon and only means of defense. It wouldn't do her much good now; her hands were incapable of doing much more than grasping the handles of her bag. She looked up at the basement door, trying to prepare herself for the horrors that lay beyond it. She felt like she did when she was a kid, not knowing what the real world held, the quiet solitude of the basement became her childhood bedroom.

Her eyes glazed as tears began to well up. She thought of all the people that she loved, that loved her, they were probably all dead now. They were either shambling around in state of unlife or a defiled corpse with the flesh stripped from their bones. Her husband lay on the cellar floor, his skull cracked open, leaking its gory contents onto the cold cellar concrete. Michael was still probably on the stairs, neck twisted at an unnatural angle, his vision taking in the ceiling above the stairs.

The upstairs was where the seat of her nightmares lay. Michael had crept into his sibling's bedrooms that night and killed them while they slept. Trisha and David didn't hear a thing while their two youngest children were messily devoured. They only woke up when Michael charged into their room, his breath reeking of blood and death, his unquenchable thirst for more flesh still unsated.

Michael and David fought savagely. David was a powerful man who exercised on a regular schedule. He was surprised when Michael bowled him over in a clumsy charge and even more surprised and frightened when Michael bit heavily into his arm. Trisha watched as the two men fought; she started screaming when she saw Michael pull his head back with a gob of flesh from David's arm clenched between his teeth. The fight ended when David managed to manhandle Michael into the hallway and throw him down the stairs.

Trisha stood at the top of the stairs and watched as Michael picked himself up. Michael looked up the stairs at his mother with no recognition in his eyes whatsoever. Nothing living was in his eyes. Michael started shambling back up the stairs, his eyes never leaving Trisha's. Trisha felt David's hand on her shoulder and saw his arm extend from behind her, the .357 pistol gripped in his hand. Her hands flew to her mouth and she whirled to look at David as the powerful weapon roared once.

A wet splash and the dead thump of a body hitting the floor were her only memories of the death of her firstborn. The body slid down a few stairs and lay at the bottom, a red blossom just left of the center of his forehead. Each step was painted with a crimson paintbrush, blood seeping into the tan carpeting, coloring it a disquieting shade of red.

The sound of the shot still ringing in her ears, Trisha first noticed the bloody footprints leading into and out of all of the children's rooms. She let out a sob and pushed David's shoulder, turning him towards the hallway with the open doors. The black mouth of each doorway promised grief beyond compare.

Trisha felt David's arm encircle her, whispering in her ear, they both walked towards the room of Andrew, only 6 years old. She could see his hand tremble ever so slightly as he reached in and turned on the light switch. Flashback visions of the scene made Trisha rock back and forth on the cold concrete of the basement floor. Sobbing with long harsh breaths, her minds eye continued to play the picture in vivid detail.

Gobbets of flesh covered the floor and the rocketship bedspread of young Andrew. His mouth was open in a scream. His throat and neck were torn asunder, spraying his pristine white pillow, leaving a bloody halo of death and gore surrounding his horrified face. His chest had claw marks across it, exposing the pale white of the bone below his tender skin.

Trisha turned into her husband's broad chest. She could hear his heart racing even through the ringing in her ears from the gunshot moments earlier. She cried, harder than she had ever cried before. David turned the light off.

Trisha felt herself being moved towards young Dana's room. Her crying and sobbing only increased as they crossed the few feet between the bedroom doors. Bloody footprints on the floor marked the passage of the monster between the rooms like a cannibalistic doctor making the rounds in a demented hospital for the damned.

"Snick." It was a small sound, but it heralded a sight that Trisha would never forget, one that would haunt her for the rest of her life. A scene that she would relive every night before she slept. What was left of Dana lay spread about the room. Michael had torn the young child limb from limb, dismembering her before she even had a chance to cry out. The baby blue walls were covered in gore. Bits of flesh and hair adorned the walls. There was even blood on the ceiling.

Trisha tried to look away, but as she did, she saw the face and skull of her four-year old daughter lying partially underneath the once beautiful bedroom set. Her eyes and mouth were closed, but the back of her head had been caved in and the contents spilled out beside the grotesque remainder. Veins, flesh, and tendons dangled from the neck spilling their vital fluids on the hardwood floor. A partially crushed vertebra peeked from beneath the spaghetti-like remainder of her daughter's neck. Even covered in blood, the white color of the bone shone through the color providing a stark contrast to the dark red of the rest of the room.

Trisha's vision started to go gray, and finally black as she fell to the floor, collapsing into the welcoming arms of oblivion. She woke in the basement with David. She had no idea what time it was or how much time had passed. She couldn't ask David either because he wouldn't talk. He wouldn't do anything except stare straight ahead for the next two days. He finally took some water on the second day but still remained in a catatonic state.

On the fourth day, Trisha woke up to the sound of her husband moaning. When she checked on him, he had fallen from the chair where he had been sitting. His body was convulsing and shaking. Backing away, she knew what happened next. The radio station that had managed to keep broadcasting until the day prior had prepared her for this.

When her husband stood up, his eyes glassed over and dried out from lack of bodily fluids, she had the bat in hand. She had two four-inch nails driven through the end making it a fairly effective weapon. Trisha cried as he stumbled towards her. She swung wildly when she thought he was in range. The bat connected with a small "spink-thud" sound.

One of the spikes penetrated David's temple; a single rivulet of blood ran down the side of his ashen face. His body convulsed on the end of the bat as Trisha let it go and backed against the wall shelving. A Mason jar toppled from the shelf and shattered on the floor while David shuddered and moaned.

A few moments later his body toppled forward, the handle of the bat hitting the floor first. It ripped from his skull, tearing a chunk of flesh from the side of his face. The body fell facedown on the cold concrete floor of the basement. Trisha stepped gingerly beside the body, reaching for the bat. David's gray hand grasped her hand as she reached for the bat, she screamed as he levered himself up. His mouth was open, his swollen tongue allowing only an ungodly moan to escape his throat. She yanked her hand as hard as possible from this cold iron grip.

It worked and she tumbled backwards and saw the bat underneath her legs. Standing up, she grabbed the bat and landed another blow to the side of her husband's face. She vaguely remembered landing blow after blow until her arms couldn't move anymore.

When she woke the next day, her face and hands were clean but her clothes were covered in crimson stains. She found the bat beside her. One of the nails was dull and bent; the other was almost entirely hammered back out of the bat. The bat was coated in a thin slime that she knew had to be blood. She glanced up only once at the misshapen head of her dead husband. It looked like a partially deflated basketball. Half of it was completely demolished, the other half caving in on itself.

Trisha looked at the basement door. She had to act now; she couldn't last much longer in this house. The bodies of her three dead children were upstairs and her dead husband was 15 feet from her. The gunshot meant someone was out there. Someone was still alive.


	3. Lost and Found Chapter 3

Jack got up and gazed at the final unexplored door in the hallway. He doubted that it would be a cache of weapons, food, and wanton women, but he could always dream. Pulling himself up from the floor, he trudged down the hallway and stood before the rickety door. Rust spotted the once shiny brass handle; a small hole in the facing of the door implied someone had kicked it.

Pistol in one hand, he turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. His other hand quickly moved up to support the pistol as he scanned the room. Light filtered under a garage door and through the windows. The sun cast its yellow rays through the grimy panes of glass, faintly illuminating the room. The angle of the rays showed the sun was low in the sky; its heat was fading along with its light.

Jack rounded the corner in the L-shaped room and was surprised and elated to see a 70's era Ford pickup truck sitting in the parking bay. The truck was a sun-faded red in color with white striping along the sides. Jack tore his eyes away from it and focused on surveying the rest of the room.

Half-empty cardboard boxes littered the area around the parking bay and the doorway. It took all of Jack's willpower not to just hop in the truck, find the keys and speed out of this claustrophobic mausoleum. He had a little time before the sun set and could afford to make sure this room was entirely clear before he made his last run through here for supplies.

Completing his circuit of the room, Jack found no evidence of any "them". He just couldn't bring himself to call them zombies. Zombies were creatures from movies, not real monsters that murdered your friends and family.

Invoking all the good luck charms he could think of, Jack opened the door of the truck. He reached his hand in and moved his hand under the dusty steering column and felt around the dashboard. His grasping fingers found an empty ignition switch. His heart fell just a bit. It was never that easy. He glanced at the upholstered bench seat and saw a small key ring sitting on the passenger side. He grabbed the key ring and was elated to see a small Ford symbol on one of the two keys on the ring. He pressed the Ford key into the ignition and let out a sigh of relief when it slid completely in. He had a ride out of this place. He didn't know where he was going yet, but any place in the open was better than being trapped in this dank oversized coffin.

Pushing the keys into his pants pocket, Jack went back to the hallway and into the back room. Denny still lay in his final resting place on the floor. Flies buzzed around his corpse, and the smell was almost palpable. Jack scraped all of his possessions into the backpack and fled the room.

Trisha picked up the heavy pistol from where it lay next to her husband. He had brought it with them into the basement in case they needed to defend themselves. David taught her how to use it when he first purchased it, but it was a long time since she had actually fired it.

Turning off the light and moving as quietly as she possibly could, Trisha walked up the steps to the basement entrance where a dim sliver of light shown through the bottom crack of the door. She felt around in the dark above the door for the broken hockey stick that was propping it closed. Her hand found the stick and she moved it aside. Unlocking the simple doorknob, she twisted the handle and peeked out the door. She could see clearly into her kitchen.

It was in a horrible state of disarray. Pans littered the floor; utensils were lying haphazardly on the counter and strewn amongst the pots on the floor. A moldy loaf of bread sat next to a pair of bananas that had almost completely decomposed into a puddle of component juices on the counter. She opened the door a little more. She held the weighty pistol in one shaking hand. Light seeped in through the kitchen windows, dimming as it shone through the translucent curtains.

She finally put one foot on the kitchen floor, sliding her foot along the linoleum. There was no sound coming from the house. Nothing was running, there were no shuffling steps to be heard, not even a creak of air conditioning or heating. It was eerie, almost supernatural, like even the house was doing its best to be quiet.

Trisha looked around when she was fully in the kitchen. The light coming through the windows indicated there wasn't much daylight left. She didn't think she could make it alone once it was dark outside. She had to act quickly if she was going to get help.

Trisha walked through the kitchen and into the living room. There, across from the closed front door were the stairs leading up to the second floor. On the stairs was her baby, Michael, his head decimated by a single bullet. She stopped when she was a few yards from the scene of carnage. Fright, rage, and heartbreak surged through her. Steeling herself, she slowly walked towards the front door.

She hadn't noticed it before, but the front door was slightly ajar. There could be one of them in here! A cold sweat swept over her. She whirled around expecting to see a grotesquely blackened cadaver standing over her, but there was nothing there. Just the dust motes in the dying sunlight.

Trisha turned back towards the front door and almost screamed when she saw a black and greenish hand grasping the inner edge of the front door. The rest of the body followed as it pushed its way into the living room. A monstrous parody of a human being, this creature was bloated beyond normal human boundaries. A round abdomen, full of necrotic gasses, preceded the creature into the room.

She gasped as a smell beyond comprehension wafted into her nasal passages. She was barely able to raise the gun with both hands and pulled the trigger. KERACK! The first shot went wide and tore through the reinforced front door, leaving a sizeable hole in it. Trisha stumbled backwards with the force of the pistol's kickback. She bumped into the doorjam leading into the kitchen and the smell became too much. She turned her head and vomited. Gagging and spitting, she wiped her mouth and saw the creature heading towards her.

She took aim with both hands again and pulled the trigger. KERACK! The bullet ripped through the left side of the creature's decaying skull. A dark green viscous fluid splattered from the shot, showering the once clean carpet in putrified gore.

Trisha let out a harsh cry as she bent over once again, vomit and bile streaming from her mouth. The vile-tasting fluid dribbled down her chin and pooled on the carpet bordering the kitchen and the living room. Sinking to her knees, Trisha aimed once more, praying that the gun was fully loaded when David last used it on Michael.

Hands shaking, her aim wandered between dead-on and a complete miss. The creature stood six feet in front of Trisha, its glassy eyes fixated on her. Trisha shut her eyes for a moment and pulled the trigger. KERACK!

The bullet landed just right of center and disintegrated the rotting flesh and bone. There was a wet glopping sound as the contents of its head fell free from their confines. Black slime streamed onto the carpet as it stood there. Moments later, it toppled to the right, landing on the plush carpet. As it fell, its stomach burst open. The contents spilled out, and a visible wave of smell enveloped the two rooms. Maggots squirmed amongst the rotting bounty from the creature. Partially chewed body parts, slime, and decayed flesh covered the floor.

Trisha gagged again, this time there was nothing left to vomit out. She picked herself up, made sure her bag was secure, and headed for the front door again. She knew that she didn't have much time, those three gunshots would have attracted the attention of whatever else was outside her house.

KERACK! A pause. KERACK! A pause. KERACK! Three gunshots in a row. Jack was a hunter when he was much younger and knew that was the signal for help. Someone out there needed help.

Jack finished scraping everything into his backpack and ran through the hallway into the garage area. He hopped into the open door of the truck and looked for a garage door opener. It was clipped to the passenger side visor.

He turned the key in the ignition and the engine roared to life. Jack breathed a sigh of relief. Closing the truck door, he grabbed the pistol and checked to make sure it was ready to go. Safety off, and a live one in the chamber. Jack jabbed the button on the garage door opener and shifted the truck into reverse.

Trisha stumbled into the street, clutching her bag and the pistol. At least 15 of the creatures were wandering towards her house. She looked around for some sign of a living person, but there was none.

Unbidden tears began to flow, she was sure she was going to die here, right in front of her home. Then she heard the sound of an engine coming to life. She gasped and started to run towards the sound.

Jack hammered the accelerator down as he shifted into reverse. Four of the creatures stood outside the garage bay, he watched in the rearview mirror as they disappeared beneath the back bumper and the tires of the truck. The steering wheel bucked beneath his hands as the creatures fell underneath the tires.

As soon as he was clear of the garage bay, he spun the wheel to the right, whipping the front end of the truck towards the alley and the empty lot. Jack shifted back into drive and hit the accelerator again. The truck jumped and took off across the alleyway and into the empty lot.

Steering to avoid the grasping hands and dead stares of the monsters in the lot, Jack drove towards where the nearest residence he could see. The truck bounced and heaved across the lot, shuddering when it came back into contact with the ground. It took all of Jack's strength to keep the truck from spinning around or running into the living dead that littered the area.

Trisha heard an engine racing, its sound getting closer. She started waving her hands in the air, even though she couldn't see the vehicle yet. She moved as quickly as she could, yelling and waving, sidestepping the creatures that were in her path.

Jack saw two white hands above the heads of the monsters ahead of him. They looked like they were waving back and forth. That had to be whoever was in trouble. And if they weren't in trouble before, they would be in just a few minutes. Hordes of the monsters were heading for the unsuspecting survivor. Jack shifted the truck into a lower gear; he was going to need the power. There was a crowd of undead between him and whomever he was rescuing.

Stamping hard on the pedal, Jack hit the edge of the crowd. Bodies flew from his path as the ton of steel and gas plowed through them. Jack kept the pedal pressed, powering through the crowd like he was trying to drive through a stream.

One arm smashed through the window of the truck, grasping at Jack's arm. Jack looked into the face of the creature. Its black eyes didn't register anything human; the desiccated face only barely recognizable as once belonging to the same species as Jack. Jack raised the .38 and pulled the trigger. The point blank shot blew the top of its head off and the corpse fell backwards.

Trisha saw a corpse fly through the air and land five feet from her. When it landed, it disintegrated, the bones of the creature just fell apart and it became a greasy slick on the sidewalk. Trisha noticed that she was completely surrounded now. She was so intent before on finding the engine that she didn't notice how many of the things had appeared. Trisha backed up against the fence behind her, her hands dropping to her sides. She wasn't going to make it, there were too many of them.

Jack broke through the crowd and saw the first live person he'd seen in days. She was a frumpy housewife, dressed in a black and white floral print dress. Her hair was cut in a bob but it was unkempt and matted. Her back was against a small garden fence; her eyes were stuck on the group of creatures advancing towards her. Jack saw three more of the undead coming from behind her. She didn't even know they were there.

Jack stomped on the brake, fifteen feet from her. He opened the door and stood on the inside ledge of the truck. He leveled his pistol at the closest of the three creatures shambling up from behind her and fired.

A clean shot, the creature fell backwards like a domino. Jack aimed again. The second round found its mark and the creature toppled. Hoping his last shot was as good as the first two; Jack targeted the third creature behind the woman. BLAM! A glancing shot, but it was enough, the creature lost a precious second while it recovered.

"Get in!" Jack shouted and waved at the woman.

Her eyes slid over to Jack. The creatures were mere feet in front of her now. She looked again at them and ran. Her legs obeyed a primal need to flee and she crossed the ground to the truck almost instantaneously. She squeezed past Jack and threw herself into the passenger seat.

Jack sat back down on the seat, slammed the door and accelerated forward. He dodged through yards and avoided most contact with the creatures in front of them.

Jack finally stopped the truck when they reached an open space where they could see in all directions. Not a single thing moved around them.

Jack turned to his companion. "Hi, my name is Jack."

Trisha looked at the man in front of her. His clothing was torn and his face was grimy. She imagined she looked very similar. She extended her now steady hand. "Hi, my name is Trisha. It's nice to meet you."

THE END


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